


The Chaos After You

by Astri



Series: The Chaos After You [2]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies)
Genre: Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie), Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie) Trailer, Death Fic, Fix-It of Sorts, Flashbacks, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Introspection, Post-Thor: Ragnarok (2017), might as well add that tag now, ngl i wrote this out of spite at gagnarok, no infinity war spoilers bc i have no idea what happens ok, posting this before i watch infinity war tomorrow goodbye, update: i hate myself for writing this
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-24
Updated: 2018-04-24
Packaged: 2019-04-27 11:22:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,950
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14424357
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Astri/pseuds/Astri
Summary: Loki sees his brother for one last time.--"I’ve yet to mend all the cracks between us. I’ve yet to give you any happiness. I only just got you back. How am I supposed let you go?”





	The Chaos After You

_“Loki, wake up. Loki...”_

Distantly, he sensed a voice calling his name. Instinctively he strained to reach it, hastily latching onto it before it faded away. It was the anchor to reality he needed—his mind flickered into consciousness.

Loki awoke feeling light and unshackled, tranquil and relieved for the first time in a long time. Languidly he extended his senses to seek out the voice that had been calling for him, but all that surrounded him was silence and darkness. Confused and disoriented, he willed himself to focus. Summoning the precious little seiðr he managed to preserve, he gradually conjured up for himself an illusory form and a small, limited field of vision. Hazily, he could discern two figures before him, one cradling the other in his arms.

_Thor._

Even before Loki could see clearly, he knew it was the person he had been waiting for. Crouching with his back to Loki was his brother, his recently shorn hair still looking so odd and unfamiliar. Having lived over a millennium of identifying the God of Thunder with his lustrous golden mane—he had often marveled at how it had been such a stark contrast to his own dark raven locks, once upon a time—Loki just couldn't get used to the new image. Maybe, if given time—but time was the one luxury he no longer had. _You're late,_ he wanted to tell his brother, but he no longer possessed a voice, either.

Tentatively, he lifted a hand and brushed it lightly across the hair at the nape of Thor’s neck. “ _Good for you, Brother, at last your hair matches your oafishness,_ ” he remembered chaffing his brother on the ship, casually running his fingers across the coarsely shorn hair at his nape. Predictably, it had earned him a jibe at his own hair. _"It's called an image change, Brother. I was going to suggest you get a haircut too, but looking at how awfully greasy it is, I suspect you're in more desperate need of a hair wash,"_ Thor had said in response, turning to face him with a smug grin. _“Do you need me to do it for you, baby Brother?”_ he had offered in jest, taking a lock of Loki’s hair and twirling it around his finger. Loki had rolled his eyes exaggeratedly, but didn’t move away despite himself. He had almost been tempted to say ‘yes’, just to see what Thor would have done. _“Heard that before. Try something original,”_ he had opted to quip back instead, and thus sparked off a playful banter and scuffle that had them both laughing breathlessly...

But he could no longer feel anything where his fingers touched now. He smiled at the memory nonetheless.

Thor was speaking softly to the figure lying still and quiet in his arms, head bowed and eyes obscured from Loki’s view. Loki looked on wistfully, wishing he could hear his brother, but he didn’t have sufficient seiðr left to recover the rest of his senses; he could barely even move. He could see his brother, at least; he should be satisfied—

 _Satisfaction is not in my nature_ , he thought defiantly, flexing his fingers powerlessly. _If only_ —

“I’ve always thought the world of you.”

Loki froze, stilling his hand. Just now, Thor’s voice had resounded in his mind like a dearly remembered song, so clear and mellow. An echo of his words from before, yet of an overtone so different, so miraculously _sweet_.

“That has never changed—even when our paths had differed. Loki, can you hear me?” Thor sounded hushed and gentle—so unlike his usual brash self. Loki closed his eyes, drinking in every word, feeling like he could cry.

 _I’m listening_ , he voiced in his thoughts, hoping it would convey somehow—hoping his brother would keep talking and stay with him, for just a little while longer.

“I didn’t mean what I told you on Sakaar—I only said them out of pique—I just, I thought you faked your own death and I—why didn’t you tell me?” Thor’s voice had become desperate, almost pleading.

 _Would you have listened?_ Loki thought ruefully, dropping his hand.

He didn’t mean to sound accusing. He knew he shouldn't be feeling indignant—Thor hadn’t known. But he couldn’t help feeling wounded when he remembered how Thor had reproached and dismissed him so coldly on Sakaar. He really hadn’t expected to survive on Svartalfheim—he wasn't pretending. He had laid down his life, and thought he had breathed his last.

It was by a twist of fate that he had ended up alive—whether it had been a blessing or a curse, till now he couldn’t decide. When he had regained consciousness, the first thing he felt hadn’t been pain, but dread—

 _"If you fail, if the Tesseract is kept from us, there will be no realm, no barren moon, no crevice where he cannot find you,”_ the Mad Titan's servant had warned him.

 _“Your birth right was to die,”_ his father had condemned him, before sentencing him to life imprisonment and forbidding him from seeing his mother ever again.

 _“I know you seek vengeance as much as I do. You help me escape Asgard and I will grant it to you, vengeance. And afterwards, this cell,”_ his brother had promised him.

What place had there been for him in the world? Where could he have gone?

Head throbbing, he had frantically run through all the possibilities in his mind. In the end, he had only one answer: Asgard. It had been the only place he ever wanted to be, even if he did not belong. But if he went back he refused to spend the rest of his life there rotting in the dungeons, caged like a savage monster needing to be contained. It was amidst despair, trepidation and hatred that he had conceived what he thought was his only option—but how was he supposed to tell Thor all of that?

How could he have possibly laden Thor with his own burden, when the dutiful son of Odin hadn’t yet been over grieving the loss of his father? When the valiant, loyal prince of Asgard yet had the weight of his people’s fate on his shoulders? He couldn’t—but at the very least, he could shoulder all the blame. If nothing else, he would let Thor resent him, if it meant distracting his brother from the grief, even a little. He’d rather be hated than pitied, besides—he had long been used to the former sentiment anyway.

The one thing he couldn’t ever bear from his brother, however, was indifference. It was a truth he had painfully come to learn during their time on Sakaar and even now wished he never did. It had hurt so much, to think that Thor didn’t care about him anymore, to think that Thor didn't _want_ him anymore—

 _“You think you know pain?”_ A chilling voice rang in his mind, ruthless and mocking. Loki smiled mirthlessly, fists clenching. That’s right; how foolish he had been, to have thought that he had lived through the worst of the pain. How naive he had been, to have believed that he could finally have happiness right by Thor’s side. How despaired he had been, when the Mad Titan had arrived at long last just to mercilessly crush that hope, almost destroying _his whole_   _world_ —

“ _He will make you long for something as sweet as pain.”_

Feeling weak, he willed the dreadful memory from his mind, reminding himself that Thor was safe, that Thor was _here_.

Sometimes, Loki wondered if it would have been easier if— _if only_ —he didn’t care so much.

 _If I had told you, would you have cared?_ He wondered, gazing at his brother with conflicting emotions. 

“If you had told me,” Thor began hoarsely, and it was so easy for Loki to believe—to pretend that his brother could actually hear him. “If I knew, I wouldn’t have—no, no, that's not right,” he shook his head violently, as if forcing it to clear, “I'm sorry, I’m making it all about myself again, aren't I?” he asked in a small voice that didn't at all befit the mighty God of Thunder, and Loki couldn’t help frowning.

It suddenly occurred to him where he had heard that voice before. It was the voice of his brother who had tearfully held onto his hand and whispered apologies to him profusely the time he had been gravely injured, more than two centuries ago. That day, Loki had told Thor that he wasn't feeling well, but Thor had insisted that he join their hunting expedition anyway, promising to stop for a break if he needed it. Later, Loki had felt faint on his horse and wanted to call out to his brother, but Thor had ridden too far ahead with Sif and the Warriors Three to hear him. He remembered the chagrin he had felt as he fell, when he imagined how his brother's companions might again mock him for being a weakling and hindrance.

It didn’t happen, though—when Loki had awoken in his bedchambers several days later, Thor had been the only one with him. He had dismissed everyone else and stayed alone to accompany Loki the whole time he rested and healed, stubbornly refusing to leave Loki's bedside and denying any visitor that wasn't their father or mother. He kept talking to Loki and fussed over him, apologising to him more often than not. At first, Loki had wanted to tell Thor to stop with the constant apologies as soon as he could muster a voice, because he was being too noisy and also because it really wasn’t his fault; Loki had wanted to go with him. In the end, though, he couldn’t bring himself to say it. It had been so long since his brother had last lavished him with all his time and attention, he had been unwilling to give it up despite himself.

Ever since his adolescent years Loki had hated being coddled; he was well aware of his own strength and wanted to be seen as nothing less than an equal to Thor. But he decided to let himself be pampered then— _just this once,_ he had told himself, not for the first time (and not for the last, as it had turned out in the decades to come). Loki was a liar, after all, even to himself. _“Brother, read me a story?”_ he had asked instead in an embarrassingly childish voice, squeezing the larger hand in his, feeling impossibly warm when Thor had instantly lit up like the sun. He wondered when everything had started to change, when was it that the sun had started burning too hot and too bright for him to bear, that he had turned to taking refuge in the shadows.

Watching his grief-stricken brother, the light all but gone from him now, Loki couldn’t help placing a comforting hand over his shoulder, despite knowing full well that he could no longer offer any warmth.

“You risked your life to protect me on Svartalfheim—I shouldn’t have doubted that,” Thor continued hoarsely. “Yet again you have protected me today, but I’ve only failed to protect _you_ , time and time again.”

 _You give yourself too much credit, Brother.._. Loki tried to sound as light-hearted as he could.   _It was my choice. It was never your fault._

“As your older brother,” Thor only went on relentlessly, “I should have done better to protect you from harm—from the lies, from the cold and dark, from _me_.” His voice cracked at the end, his shoulders visibly beginning to tremble. If it were possible, Loki felt a sharp pang in his chest right then and there.

_Idiot, you couldn't have known._

He lowered himself to a kneeling position and encircled his arms around his brother from behind, letting his head hover over the shoulder he had leant on countless times since he was old enough to remember; the same shoulder where he had buried his face and let his tears spill only days ago, as they held each other tenderly but firmly in an embrace that had simply felt too long overdue. Closing his eyes, he could almost imagine the familiar, beloved scent of storm and musk, from memories of both centuries and days old.

“I’m sorry,” rasped Thor. “I’m sorry I never noticed. I'm sorry I left you to hurt on your own. I’m sorry I never tried to understand what you were going through... I know I’ve been the _worst brother—_ ”

 _You know that’s not true..._ If only he could, Loki would have tightened his arms around his brother.

“But Loki, won’t you please give me another chance to make it right?” pleaded Thor desperately.

_Sentiment. And I thought you had agreed to let it burn, Brother._

He meant to sound nonchalant, but he couldn’t help the sadness in his voice when he was reminded of Thor’s willingness to discard him on that wretched planet. He remembered when Thor had activated the obedience disc on him without hesitation, watching with glee as he convulsed and writhed in pain on the floor. Thor had been saying something to him before leaving, but the pain had been too excruciating for him to hear anything at all. It wasn’t just the physical pain—it had hurt so much to know and ascertain that Thor would truly abandon him without qualms. He wondered what he had been so desperately trying to prove then, when he had pretended to betray his brother. Had he honestly been expecting Thor to urge him to come home with him? How naïve. His brother had genuinely believed that there wasn’t any good left in him—he had been scheming and guarding against him even as he claimed to have thought the world of him. But no matter how wounded and indignant he had felt, he knew it couldn’t be worse than the thought of his brother possibly dying at the hands of the Goddess of Death. And so, he went back.

“Loki, won’t you say something to me?”

Like the key to breaking a spell, Thor’s words harshly snapped him back to reality. Loki withdrew his arms from around his brother and stood up shakily, feeling faint. That’s right; Thor couldn’t hear him. How careless and silly he was, to have allowed himself to be deluded by his own illusion. Now that his mind had cleared, he noticed that Thor’s voice sounded far too hoarse and weak—he didn't know how he hadn't registered it earlier. How long had Thor been here for, talking endlessly to someone who wouldn't ever answer him?

 _You’ve gone quite mad, Brother..._ Loki stared at his brother incredulously.

“Loki, tell me this isn’t real,” whispered Thor imploringly. “I won’t get upset this time—I promise…”

 _Thor, it's time to go. You’ll finally be free now. It's for the best, isn't it?_ Lokiknew his brother couldn’t hear him, but he had to try snapping him out of this madness.

“Don’t you _dare_  leave me, Loki,” ordered Thor in a strangled voice. “I—I’ve yet to mend all the cracks between us. I’ve yet to give you any happiness. I only just got you _back_. How am I supposed let you _go_?”

 _You are as demanding as ever..._ Loki smiled ruefully, dropping his gaze.

“If you’re going, at least take me with you. I don't have anyone else left...”

Loki’s eyes snapped up at that, unable to believe what Thor was saying. He desperately needed to knock some sense into his brother before he wrecked himself. He placed his hands over Thor’s ears and channeled his remaining seiðr, hoping it might do something.

_Brother, listen to me. You don’t need me. You have friends who care about you. Even now they must be waiting for you. Don’t you have a world to save? Isn’t that what heroes do? Aren’t you a hero, Thor?_

“What’s the point in everything—what’s the point in saving the world, if I can’t even save anyone I _love_? If I end up having to lose _you_? Why did you do that, Loki? You fool, I thought you—No, _no_ , I should’ve _known_. _I’m_ the fool, I’m a fool...”

_Seems like we’re both fools, then... That is why you should know better than anyone, Brother—I’d rather see the world burn to ash a thousand times over than ever live in it without you. I’m not a good person—I know that. But you’re not like me, Thor. You have so much more._

“How did it come to this, Loki? How did it come to this…”

 _I know I’ve disappointed you... But Brother, I wonder if in the end, I have made you proud? I wonder if perhaps, you have found some good in me after all?_ _But you know, those have never, ever mattered to me... You asked me why I did it, but there has only ever been one reason, don’t you see? I suppose this is the last time I'll be saying it to you, so just this once, will you promise me you’ll listen?_

“Loki...”

_If there is one thing you must remember of me, let it be this: **Never doubt that I love you.** Can you hear me? My brother, my half—_

“I only ever wanted you to _come home_ …”

_My home._

Closing his now sightless eyes, Loki dipped his head and kissed the King of Asgard on his crown. The last of his seiðr finally faded away, adjoining the faraway stars in the night sky.

“Loki? Where are you?”

In the distance, lightning crashed and thunder roared.

**Author's Note:**

> _"Doubt thou the stars are fire;  
>  Doubt that the sun doth move;  
> Doubt truth to be a liar;  
> But never doubt I love."_
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> ***


End file.
